


The Villain of Collinwood

by RobberBaroness



Category: Dark Shadows (1966)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Harlequin
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-14
Updated: 2015-04-14
Packaged: 2018-03-22 22:49:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,571
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3746434
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RobberBaroness/pseuds/RobberBaroness
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Few defy Quentin Collins and come away unscathed.</p><p>Victoria Winters has grown up in the long, dark shadows cast by Collinwood. Yet when the master holds her sick friend’s fate in his hands, she must finally confront the man whose presence is as brooding as his windswept New England lands.  </p><p>Men quake at Quentin Collins’ mere command, yet this slip of a girl defies him at every turn! His fury at her is matched only by his desire, and Victoria's pure innocence burns brightly in the darkness of the hall. But the light threatens to lay bare secrets that could ruin them both.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Villain of Collinwood

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by the summary of "The Master of Stonegrave Hall", by Helen Dickson.

Technically speaking, Victoria Winters had all the time in the world.  In practice, however, time-travel was not without its risks, and the sooner she could find out what had made Quentin Collins into a malcontented ghost and avert those events, the better chance she had of saving David’s life.  Barnabas, Julia and Professor Stokes were all counting on her; she was the one who had the most experience with time-travel, and thus the best person for the mission.

Just how she was going to manage it, Victoria wasn’t quite sure.  At least she’d learned from last time and worn her longest, most conservative dress for the occasion; she wouldn’t pass for a fashionable Victorian lady, but at least she wouldn’t look jarringly out of place.  When she closed her eyes and stepped through the door Professor Stokes had her visualize, it was with very specific instructions:

Find Quentin Collins, the one written down in diaries and papers as a thoroughgoing scoundrel, the villain of Collinwood.  Then save him, redeem him, or kill him and exorcise his spirit- anything to break the deadly chain of events that held David’s life in the balance.

In many ways, Collinwood of 1897 looked much like the Collinwood she knew so well...all except for the state of the Old House, which looked as bleak as it had when she’d first arrived.  No one had paid to have it restored, or bothered to have it demolished, only letting it sit and crumble over the years.

If the Old House really was an abandoned ruin at this point, it would be an ideal place to hide and get her bearings.  She picked her way through the weeds and stepped in through a window, and had almost convinced herself of her success before she was interrupted.

“And just what are you doing here?”

Victoria looked up at the woman’s voice and found herself facing a stranger, someone with no portraits hung on any of the Collins walls.

“I thought this house was abandoned- I’m so sorry, I’m not a thief.”

The strange woman shrugged.  Something in her expressive face and professional demeanor reminded Victoria of Julia Hoffman, though of course that was ridiculous.

“If you were a thief, you’d be better off elsewhere.  But why is a pretty young lady hiding out in empty houses?  What can you be if not a criminal?  Understand, I will not hold it against you.”

“My name is Victoria Winters.  I’m-” she had never been good at time traveling introductions- “I’m in town because it’s very important that I deliver a message to Quentin Collins.  And I crept into what I thought was an empty building because I have no place else to stay.”

The woman started laughing at that, but she also seemed to be much more relaxed.

“Quentin Collins!  Are you one of his beauties?  Or are you bringing news of a few more bastard children?”

“Neither, exactly.  But if you live here I’ll be going…”

The woman shook her head.

“I am not so cruel as to throw a young girl into the woods in the dead of night.  You may be very foolish, but there couches and blankets enough in this house for one night.”

“Thank you so much, miss-”

“Magda Rakosi.”

Victoria murmured more thanks to Magda before the sheer exhaustion of travelling through the years hit her and she collapsed in mid-sentence.

 

***

 

“Well, well.  What have we here?”

Victoria’s eyes fluttered open, and she found herself staring at the face of the most handsome man she’d ever met.  She sat up (on the couch, where it seemed Magda had kindly placed her after she’d fainted), and did her best to recover her self-possession.

“Are you Quentin Collins, by any chance?”  He had to be- in her experience, no one could have eyes quite that piercing or hair quite that stylish without having a few dreadful secrets, and the villain of Collinwood likely had more than most.  He grinned in response to her question.

“The very same.  Has my reputation preceded me?”

A reputation for endangering yourself and everyone around you, Victoria wanted to say.  “In a way.  I actually came here looking for you.”

Quentin seemed to take this as a license to sit down next to her and put his arm about her shoulder, and she was forced to clarify a bit.

“Please, Mr. Collins!  I don’t know what you you’re thinking about me, but I assure you, it isn’t going to work out.”

“What I’m thinking about you?  You arrive mysteriously, claim to know about my future, and of course you’re also an unearthly beauty.  What am I to think of you?”

Victoria had been through this before, and decided to save time.

“I’m a witch.”

“I beg your pardon?”  Quentin raised an eyebrow in a manner that suggested he was not sure whether or not to take her seriously.

“I’m a witch.  A time witch.  Look me up in any local history books- Victoria Winters, governess to the Collins family, hanged for witchcraft in 1795.  I didn’t actually die because I’m a witch and can get out of those sorts of things, and I came back here over one hundred years later because I’m a witch, and I know what’s going to happen in the future because I’m a witch.  Any more questions you have about me can be answered by the fact that I’m a witch.”

Quentin smiled, quite to Victoria’s surprise.

“How intriguing!  I dabble in black magic myself at times!”

This was very much not the response she’d hoped for.

“I’m sure you do, from what I’ve heard of you.”  It seemed as if Quentin had stopped paying attention to this line of conversation some time ago, though, for he was back to looking at her hungrily more than with curiosity.

“You are very beautiful, Miss Winters.”

“You must say that to a lot of women.”

“Only when it’s true.”  He touched her cheek, and though she knew she should have pulled away, Victoria somehow felt she could not.  “I only pursue those who are worth pursuing.  And you, my dear, would be prize.”

Victoria gritted her teeth and fought back duelling impulses to giggle like a schoolgirl or else slap his face.  Neither one would help her.

“Can we please try and be serious?  I’ve come because you’re in grave danger- if nothing is done to prevent it, you’ll be murdered this year!”

Her earnest protestations were met with laughter.

“Who would want to murder me?”

“Who wouldn’t want to murder you?” came Magda’s voice from the next room.  “Perhaps poor Jenny will return from wherever she went with a bullet for you- I wouldn’t blame her if she did.  Or what about that woman you left her for, Laura?  Perhaps she has also come to hate you.  Most women do, sooner or later.”

Quentin shook his head at that.

“I can assure you Laura won’t be making another appearance in my life ever again.  But let us not leave out my dear siblings!  Edward or Judith would happily slit my throat for a bigger portion of grandmother’s inheritance.  Carl might not, but he would certainly not endanger himself in stopping them.  Say...regarding that inheritance…”

It looked as if Quentin had an idea, and Victoria could tell that was not a good thing.

“If you’re a witch, then you can help me claim it!  You can change my grandmother’s mind, or forge a new will, one impossible for anyone to spot as a forgery!”

“Get out,” said Victoria.  “Get out right now.”  She technically had no authority over who was in the Old House, but her voice must have been intimidating, because Quentin did as she asked.  The roguish smile he wore as he left, however, was infuriating.

It haunted her all night, and into a dream that clung unusually well to her memory.  She saw poor David struggle to stay alive, while Quentin stood over him in smug anticipation.  When she stepped forward, he turned that cruel smile upon her and offered her his hand- and if she had not woken up shortly after, Victoria feared she would have taken it.

 

***

 

_A short list of people who might want to murder Quentin:_

  * _His ex-wife Jenny_

  * _His ex-lover Laura_

  * _Any of his siblings (perhaps not Carl?)_

  * _Magda, if she gets tired of him bothering her_

  * _Magda’s husband- any jealous husband, come to think of it_

  * _Someone who has something to do with black magic?_

  * _His future ghostly companion Beth_




Victoria wasn’t entirely satisfied with her list, but it was a start.  She had to work in haste, after all; Magda didn’t seem to mind her presence in the Old House, but it did technically belong to the Collins family, and she could be thrown out any moment if any of them cared to do so.  Pawning her jewelry in town gave her enough to survive for a short time, but she wasn’t looking forward to the expense of a room at the inn.

Quentin had made her an offer that morning of moving her into the guest house, but she was unsure of what obligations that might entail.  She barely knew Quentin, and yet it felt as if she knew him all too well.

A knock at the door interrupted her writing.  She opened the door, revealing a lovely (if somewhat distraught) woman wearing blonde ringlets and a serious expression.  The stranger began to speak before Victoria could ask who she was.

“I wanted to see you, Miss- I’m sorry, I don’t know your name.”

“Victoria Winters.  How do you do?”

“That would be a long and difficult question for me to answer.  My name is Beth Chavez.”

“Beth Chavez…” Victoria whispered.  It was one thing to hear David describe a spectral woman, but it was another thing entirely to see her in the flesh.

“You know my name.  Has Quentin spoken of me?”  Before Victoria could reply, Beth shook her head.  “No, I don’t want to know.  Either answer would upset me.  I came here because I wanted to see the mystery woman Quentin is keeping on the estate, and to know where I stood once and for all.”

“It isn’t...it isn’t quite like what you think.”  Victoria was willing to go into her ‘witch with fortune telling powers’ speech again, but not particularly eager.  Beth responded as if she had not even heard what Victoria said, however.

“If he loves you, I will not stand in your way.  But keep him away from me, Victoria.  I can stand being with him and I can stand losing him, but I cannot stand the endless uncertainty he loves to keep his women in!  If you are to have him, make him stop toying with me!”

Victoria was not at all certain she ‘had’ Quentin, but it was true that she’d come back to the past to fix his mistakes.  Besides, Beth looked so aggrieved that she couldn’t possibly turn her away.

“I’ll try.  I can promise you that, Beth.  You deserve better than to be deceived.”

Beth looked relieved, but still she hesitated with Victoria.

“Thank you.  I would warn you away from him, but I fear you wouldn’t listen to me.  I certainly never listened to myself.”

Victoria’s heart went out to her, and she tried to ask her to come inside.  Beth, however, rushed off as soon as her conversation was finished, as if she had gotten a painful duty out of the way.  The next Victoria was to see of her was in her dreams, where David was once again watched over by a specter.  This time, however, she saw Beth’s ghostly figure kiss his forehead and take her leave of the house.  And Quentin?  He was nowhere to be seen.

 

***

 

“You didn’t think I’d stay away for long, did you?”

Quentin caught Victoria when she was walking in the woods, the only part of Collinsport that still looked the same over the years.  She smiled at him on instinct- though why she was glad to see him, she wasn’t entirely sure- but then her face turned harsh.

“I just saved your life,” she said coldly, “and it was arguably from yourself.  Do you never give any thought at all to the women whose hearts you break?  Do you have any regard for poor Beth at all?”

“You saved my life?  From Beth?”  His look of surprise was mixed with one Victoria had not yet seen on his face- guilt.  “I never tried to be cruel to her.”

“You may not have tried to be, but you were.  If you want her, Quentin, then pledge yourself to her and be true!  If you don’t, then stop playing with her affections!  It’s killing her, and it might very well end up killing you.”

Quentin smiled.

“My little witch.  Do you know what I’d do to anyone else who spoke to me that way?”

She looked him dead in the eye, happy to meet his challenge.

“I can guess.”

It was at this point that Victoria realized she was being walked over to the guest house Quentin had spoken of the other day.  It had grown quite chilly in the woods, so she did not entirely object to stepping in with him.  It was only when he leaned down and kissed her- a kiss she had desired since first seeing him in the Old House, though she could hardly even admit it to herself- that she thought of reasons why she should go.

“So I’m just to be another woman for you to love and deceive?”

“You’re a witch!  You know more about me than I do!  How could I successfully deceive you?”  He kissed her again, and she let it last a little longer this time.

“I’ve been engaged before...more than once.  It never ends well.”  He had not exactly asked her to marry him, but still the faces of the men she once loved came unbidden.  Burke, Jeff...in her own time or in the past, there was no man she had loved and been able to keep.

“I could say the same of my marriage.  Don’t you think we should join forces and spare everyone else the bad luck we’d bring them?”

Dear god, she was tired of always being the only responsible person at Collinwood!  Just once, couldn’t she lose herself in the past?  No one from her own time would ever know...

“I shouldn’t- I’ve made this mistake before- oh, Quentin!” cried Victoria before falling into his arms.  When she gazed into his eyes, all she could see was his wickedness and the foolishness of her own decisions, but in that moment she wanted him to be wicked and to allow herself to be foolish.

Quentin ripped open the front of her dress, and covered her mouth with a kiss before she could protest the ruined garment.  

 

***

 

Victoria and Quentin fell asleep in the same bed that night, with his arms wrapped about her.  For just one night, amid all the turmoil the Collins family spread throughout the centuries, Victoria found peace and happiness with one of them.

(And then they were to learn that his wife was alive and locked up in the great house, and all the turmoil was to start over again.  Protecting the villain of Collinwood from himself turned out to be a full time job.)


End file.
